As anyone who lives with animals knows, our furry friends make life interesting. (Notice I don’t say “anyone who owns animals”—I’m pretty sure they own us, not the other way around!) Since May, Rachel & I have fostered two puppies, two kittens, and one adult dog. Alice and Alba, our two foster puppies, were both adopted in August. Just before their adoption, I picked up our foster kittens, Hide and Seek. About a week after Alice was adopted, we got Cody, our adult foster dog (who, by the way, was adopted last weekend!). It’s been quite the experience, not least because of the funny animal stories I’ve gotten out of it. Here are a few of the gems I’ve collected.

One evening last week, I was sitting in my bedroom when I heard a tinkling noise out in the hallway. I knew Cody had come upstairs, so I was a trifle unhappy when I heard that. Uh oh. That can’t be good, I thought. However, when I went out to see what sort of discipline might be needed, I discovered that Cody had peed in the litter box! Clearly, he wanted to save Rachel & I the effort of taking him outside before bed.

Later that evening, I was soaking in a bubble bath. Both Hide and Seek love to play in the bathtub, so when they saw me there, they had to investigate. From his perch on the side of the tub, Hide leaned down to sniff the bubbles, then reached out and patted them. After determining that the bubbles were safe, Hide then decided that they were fine to walk on. That’s right—Hide took a full-dunk in the bath! His reaction was instantaneous and hilarious. After springing across the room, Hide spent the next few minutes turning in circles as he tried to figure out where to start cleaning himself off!  Poor baby. (It really was pathetic, but I was laughing so hard I didn’t have the chance to comfort him.)

The kittens aren’t just fastidious in their own hygiene. They also like to “help” me clean. I have a rubber sweeper from FlyLady that’s great for getting pet hair, dregs of litter, cat/dog food crumbs, etc. up. Hide and Seek think it’s just the greatest thing when I use it—they consistently bat at it, tackle it, follow it around, and chase it whenever I’m trying to clean. They also like "helping" me make my bed. More to the point, they don’t want me to make the bed without them in it! See the video below for evidence.




Not only are Hide and Seek very tidy kittens; they’re also technologically advanced. Every time I work on my laptop, they make a beeline for the keyboard. After a few minutes of walking around on the keys and batting at the cursor, they curl up on the keyboard. I use this as an excuse to pet them instead of using the computer. In the course of their computer exploits, they have managed to: post Facebook messages and statuses, open documents on my desktop, change document names, play games of solitaire (they’re not very good), and click on links to various websites. My favorite was when one of them clicked on a link that opened an eHarmony ad. My immediate thought was, “are they trying to tell me something?”

My final silly animal story goes back to where I started this: cat litter. If I fill the litter box too full, they (I think Hide is the culprit here) scoop piles of litter out onto the floor. I’ve watched Hide do this. He looked absolutely gleeful as he swatted pawsful of litter out of the box. He would dig vigorously in the litter, watching it fly out of the box. It was clearly one of his favorite games! I've learned my lesson--don't put too much litter in the box.